Lufthansa pilots vote with a large majority for strike

The Lufthansa passengers will have to stand up on strikes of the pilots in the coming weeks. In the event of a coordination of the Union Association Cockpit (VC), a clear majority of the voting members voted for an industrial action, as a spokeswoman said.

A specific time of strike was initially not mentioned. The union’s collective bargaining commission should decide on the further procedure. In the past, Lufthansa had canceled almost the complete program during the affected period.

According to VC, 90 percent of Lufthansa pilots and 95 percent of Lufthansa-Cargo pilots have participated in the vote. They support 88 percent and 96 percent of the industrial action. The end of the vote was thus assumed.

At the end of the vote, at least 70 percent votes against the members concerned in the companies in Lufthansa and Lufthansa Cargo were necessary. Containment and non-participation in the vote were regarded as no votes. Most recently, the Lufthansa pilots had strike for one day in 2022.

The tariff conflict deals with the company pensions of the approximately 4,800 pilots. The union had entered the negotiations with the demand for a tripling of the employer share and then reduced this in the course of seven talks. However, an agreement was not reached.

“Pensions are a central foundation of life planning for pilots – at least as important as the statutory pension,” explains the spokesman for the collective bargaining commission, Arne Karstens. “We now expect Lufthansa to take the signals from the workforce seriously and finally provide a negotiable offer for company pension schemes.”

The recently deficit Lufthansa-Kerngesellschaft is going through a hard renovation program. Her boss Jens Ritter had declared that they simply had no means to increase the “already very good” company pension scheme.

On Monday, the Lufthansa board of directors also confirmed its strategy to shift the smaller Lufthansa aircraft and thus also pilot jobs to other flight operations with significantly lower wage costs. As early as 2030, around half of the short and medium-distance jets are to be flown by flight companies outside the Lufthansa core. For this purpose, the group founded the companies Discover and City Airlines.

Against this strategy, the VC as well as the UFO flight attendant, which also declared its collective bargaining as a failure. However, strikes may not be carried out against strategic corporate decisions because they are not the subject of collective agreements.